Cooking

These last few days have been crazy busy. But I have some good news; I took an Egyptian cooking class!!! Which is really exciting for me- and my new roommates and of course the family. Our Chef is a Monk at one of the Monasteries in Cairo and happens to be a talented cook! We began around 4:30 gathering around two tables surrounded with cutting boards and knives. We prepped everything for the famous stuffed vegetables, called Hashwe, slicing, dicing and hollowing out the white and purple eggplants, peppers and zucchini. We learned how to make kofte (minced meat on a kebab) which is one of my favorite meat dishes here. I helped the cook saute the rice and simultaneously burned my knee on the oven, which apparently here does not have a heat protection. You know when you peek your head through the window in the oven in America? Well it is impossible hear. The glass heats up like the oven. Bah. Everything was delicious, except for the rice pudding which was too watery. After the cooking class Maggie and I decided to go smoke sheesha and grab some fresh juice. Our brains needed a break from all the Arabic because we had been in our classroom building from 9am until 7pm. Heading over to Zamalek we were stuck in Cairo traffic which allowed us to talk to our cabby and practice our Arabic. We reached our sheesha place just in time to watch the sunset set over the Nile behind an old, intricately engraved minaret. Turns out I found a really great friend. We destressed, Maggie ordered her very first sheesha, and I ordered my usual, half lemon and half mint which is the equivalent of smoking a mojito. Though smoking flavored tobacco at times makes me feel guilty. I want to protect my lungs, but whatever. Life is short,